Slade Power sold to Darley before attempt on Newmarket’s July Cup

Slade Power beating Due Diligence at Royal Ascot. The horse will retire to Darley Stud at the end of the year. Photograph: David Davies/PA

Slade Power may be making his final European start in Saturday’s July Cup at Newmarket after his sale on Monday to Sheikh Mohammed’s Darley Stud. The horse has only recently acquired star status, having won his first Group One in the Diamond Jubilee at Royal Ascot last month, and he is the 3-1 favourite to make it two this weekend.

Darley revealed the news through Twitter on Monday afternoon, stating that the horse would remain with his trainer, Edward Lynam, until the end of the year and would continue to carry the colours of Sabena Power. However, the stud said his race programme would now consist of the July Cup followed by Australia’s VRC Sprint during the Melbourne Cup meeting, after which he will be based in Ireland for his career as a stallion.

Paddy Power, representing his mother, could not disclose the amount involved but said that the original plan had been to take in Haydock’s Sprint Cup in September. The family still owns Sole Power, another intended runner on Saturday who, as a gelding, is of rather less interest to studs and Power expects him to race on next year.

The news of Slade Power’s sale seemed to come as a surprise to the Meath-based Lynam, who rallied to report that both horses were in good form and training well. He said that Sole Power, as the more established talent of the pair, would carry the Power family’s first colours but added that this should not be interpreted as a reflection on their respective chances.

While Sole Power is hard to beat over five furlongs on fast ground, the July Cup is run over six, a distance at which he has never won, which explains why he is available at 10-1. “I’ve always argued he’d get six,” Lynam said, “but I’m not saying he’s as good at it. When he ran over six in Hong Kong last year, he beat all the local horses but just happened to run into [the Japanese] Lord Kanaloa, an exceptional animal.”

Lynam said he was not concerned about Slade Power’s finishing effort at Ascot, when he appeared to hang left across the path of the runner-up, Due Diligence. “I’d say my jockey [Wayne Lordan] probably aimed at horses that might be finishing well because the others on his side were empty. He didn’t say to me that he hung.

“He pulled up in front but he’s always done that. He’s never won by further than two lengths.”

In the Ascot winner’s enclosure Lynam joked with Aidan O’Brien, trainer of Due Diligence, telling him: “You stretch this one out to a mile, now. Don’t be going sprinting with him!” He was not surprised to see that rival’s name among Monday’s entry for the July Cup and described him as “one of the chief contenders”, adding of O’Brien: “He never listens to me.”

Suggestions that the Derby could be moved to an evening start-time to improve the flagging TV audience got a “tentative thumbs-up” from one bookmaker on Monday but David Williams of Ladbrokes suggested that 2015 would not be the right year to make such a move. The Classic race would then clash with the Champions’ League final, he said.

Lammtarra, the 1995 Derby winner who retired undefeated after that year’s Arc, died on Sunday at the age of 22. His trainer, Saeed bin Suroor, said: “He was a great horse. It is sad to lose him.”

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